Review: ‘Moonlight’ – Love Lasts Forever

The following contains MAJOR SPOILERS for “Love Lasts Forever,” the latest episode from CBS’ Friday night show, “Moonlight.” “Love Lasts Forever,” the 11th episode of “Moonlight,” exemplifies why the series was awarded the “Favorite New Drama Series” title at the People’s Choice Awards. This episode was funny, enthralling, and heart-wrenching all at once. The episode […]

The following contains MAJOR SPOILERS for “Love Lasts Forever,” the latest episode from CBS’ Friday night show, “Moonlight.”

“Love Lasts Forever,” the 11th episode of “Moonlight,” exemplifies why the series was awarded the “Favorite New Drama Series” title at the People’s Choice Awards. This episode was funny, enthralling, and heart-wrenching all at once.

The episode starts out with Mick (Alex O’Loughlin) doing some of the hottest push-ups I’ve ever seen, while his inner monologue asks “How does an immortal handle mortal feelings?” In the ensuing story, Mick does an awful lot of handling — and bottling — his feelings.

DA Josh Lindsey (Jordan Belfi) is working on a case to prosecute a man named Tajeda, a trafficking and money-laundering kingpin, who is notorious for having the loved ones of prosecutors and judges murdered. Predictably, threats are made on Beth’s life.

While Josh is getting pummeled by motor-psychos, Mick is at Beth’s place, discussing Coraline’s blood and what he hopes to find out fro it. Josh arrives — to warn Beth (Sophia Myles) that Tajeda’s people will come after her if he doesn’t drop the case. He wants to step down to protect her, but Beth persuades him to do the right thing and continue with the case.

The relationship between Beth and Josh appears to be on the mend as Mick finds he’s grappling with telling Beth how he feels about her. Beth is supposed to meet Mick at a blood analysis lab the next morning, but loses track of the time after Josh spends the night with her. Mick shows up an hour after they were supposed to meet, and finds himself in the uncomfortable position of walking in while Josh is there.

While Josh is uncomfortable with his presence, he still asks Mick to protect Beth while he goes to work.

Tajeda is arrested at his daughter’s Sweet 16 party, which makes him even more determined to get Josh out of his way.

Mick has Coraline’s blood analyzed. It appears to be perfectly normal human blood, but it appears to be the blood of a child. It’s also a rare blood type — AO negative — which far too coincidently happens to be Beth’s blood type. This raises all sorts of questions as to whether Coraline deliberately singled her out for feeding on, or if Beth’s blood somehow has the key to a cure for vampirism.

Before there is a chance to explore these questions more, a sniper tries to kill Beth, but Mick shields her; however the vial with Coraline’s blood that was in his jacket pocket is shattered.

Josh arranges for police protection for Beth, but then is abducted outside her apartment, and the police guard is shot. Beth goes after the kidnappers, and Mick goes along with her. After a high-speed car chase through LA, they track Josh’s phone to a park near an observatory. They find the car, and Mick pummels the two kidnappers, but one shoots Josh, who is just about to be rescued from the trunk, through the back seat of the car.

After Mick and Beth desperately attempt to save Josh, he dies. As he’s dying, Beth begs Mick to turn Josh into a vampire to save his life — but Mick refuses. After Josh dies, Beth refuses to talk to Mick.

Mick helps nab the Tajeda, first by getting info from one of the kidnappers — by showing his vamp face. However, Mick tells the cops Tejada is someplace else, so he can deal with him himself. He goes to Tejada’s bar, and once again puts on his vamp face, scaring the people in the bar, and then feeding on Tejada.

In the end, he tries to comfort Beth, but she won’t have anything to do with him. She blames Mick for Josh’s death because he refused to turn him. Mick tries to explain that Josh’s job ultimately killed him, and that turning him into a vampire would not be helping him. When Beth asks him “Would you have done it to save me?” he tells her he wouldn’t do it even to save her.

Beth asks him “If you hate what you are so much, then why do you go on living?”

Throughout the series, I, like many fans of “Moonlight,” have been wishing Josh would get out of the way of Mick and Beth, yet in this episode, the last thing I wanted was for Josh to die — especially the way he did. Watching Beth’s and Mick’s reaction to his death was almost as heartbreaking as watching Buffy trying to revive her mother in “The Body.”

The fine line Mick has to walk between not interfering with the relationship between Beth and Josh and confessing his own feelings to her is a painful one to walk. The writing and acting in this regard is beautifully executed.

The tension between Mick and Josh is palpable, yet each tries not to acknowledge the elephant in the room. They both love Beth, enough to put up with each other for her sake and safety.

The mystery around Coraline and her human blood is intriguing. I can’t wait to see where they go with this. Unless we get more light shed on it next week, the final pre-strike episode, the wait may be quite long.

I don’t know if this is what the writers intended, but I found the scenes where Mick uses his vamp face to scare Tajeda and his men hilarious. We finally get to see Mick deliberately showing his vampire self, the face of “el Diablo,” to terrorize the bad guys. I loved it! My daughter and I giggled from the interrogation scene through to the scene where Mick sinks his fangs into Tajeda.

What Didn’t Work

I’m not sure why Tajeda didn’t just have Josh killed right away. Why wait? Why terrorize him by threatening Beth, when just bumping him off in the first place would have done the trick? Even if the intent was to intimidate him into backing off without killing anyone, why, once it became apparent he was going to prosecute, did they kidnap him in front of Beth’s place to kill him elsewhere? They could have killed the police guard and him and then taken off. End of Josh. End of job.

They could still have had Mick and Beth trying to save Josh, with the “please vamp him” scene, in front of her place. Maybe they had a few extra minutes to kill in the story?

Still, a minor point in an overall strong episode. I’d rather have slightly flawed “Moonlight” than the bleak prospect of having no new episodes after next week’s, until the writers’ strike is resolved.

Giving Credit Where Credit Is Due

“Love Lasts Forever” was written by Josh Pate and directed by Paul Holahan.

“Moonlight” airs on CBS Fridays at 9 p.m. ET.

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Could they be a gh...gh...gh...ghost? Rut-ro! Shaggy

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